By Samie Al-Dulaimi (with photos) KABUL, Dec 26 (KUNA) -- Several companies from the Gulf are interested in mining, oil and gas investment in Afghanistan, Minister of Mining Wahidullah Shahrani said Tuesday, as the country has made procedures for foreign firms identical to their local counterparts.

"We have been communicating with Kuwait Energy and calls are being made with Emaar Mining (United Arab Emirates) and Maaden (Saudi Arabia). Both the Saudis and the Emiratis are very keen on copper and gold," he told a group of visiting Kuwaiti journalists.

The Afghan government is set to sign, in the next coming days, a deal with China's biggest oil and gas firm, CNPC, to extract and refine oil from the Amu Darya basin in the northwest of the country.

CNPC has already been working in Turkmenistan, next door, where it laid down an oil pipeline that travels all the way to China.

Companies from China, India and Canada (three of the world's largest economies) have also been successful in winning the bidding rights to develop copper and iron ore deposits to the north and south of Kabul.

Shahrani said that since assuming his role as minister, he has eased a lot of contractual procedures for foreign investors, in addition to adding the sectors of oil and gas to the ministry's new-found responsibilities.

Afghanistan has around USD 3 trillion (3,000 billion) worth of untapped underground resources like Niobium, Lithium, Copper, Iron-ore, Cobalt, gemstones and oil and gas according to US government estimates, and hopes to diversify its investments over many countries.

With its location at the heart of Central Asia and considerable size of 647,500 sq km (nearly that of France) Afghanistan hopes to benefit from these resources in building its torn-down infrastructure after decades of war and to lessen its huge dependency on international foreign aid.

"Transportation is a major problem," the minister added, noting the country's landlocked status, which makes it hard for businesses to haul goods and building material within their sites - an issue that has been solved by requesting investors in the excavation industry to build railways. "These railways will later be used to carry passengers," the minister emphasised.

Projects like these will also provide 10.6 million jobs - nearly a third of the country's population of 29 million.

However, the alarming security situation in the country has caused many international firms to overlook these opportunities, while waiting for the results of the NATO-led International Security Assistance Force pullout in 2014.

Asked about whether he believed neighbouring countries were stealing from Afghanistan's oil reserves, Shahrani said "there is no solid evidence on this." To discover many of its new-found treasures, the Afghan government took on board the expertise of the state-run US Geological Survey and NASA, increasing knowledge obtained by the Soviets during their occupation of the land, Shahrani added.

The Kuwaiti journalists, conducting the interview, are members of a Kuwait Journalists Association delegation visiting Afghanistan. The visit is the first of its kind by an Arab delegation, who includes Adnan Al-Rashed, Mishal Al-Nami, Abdulsamed Mustafa, Faisal Al-Jasim and Samie Al-Dulaimi.